Christopher Hitchens Dead

Christopher Hitchens dead, reported in BBC News 16 December 2011. Outspoken atheist journalist, speaker and defender of evolution, Christopher Hitchens has died of cancer and pneumonia at age 62. In 2007 Hitchens wrote the book God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. Fellow outspoken atheist Richard Dawkins commended Hitchens as the “finest orator of our time” and a “valiant fighter against all tyrants including God”. Hitchens maintained his strong atheism after being diagnosed with cancer and faced with death. He said in one interview: “No evidence or argument has yet been presented which would change my mind. But I like surprises.”

Editorial Comment: Perhaps the best rebuttal of Hitchens’ claims comes from his own brother Peter, who writes of his own rejection of God as a young man: “The widely accepted dismissal of faith by the intelligent and educated seemed then to be definitive proof that the thing was fake, mainly because I wanted such proof. The blatant truth that we hold opinions because we wish to, and reject them because we wish to, is so obvious that it is too seldom mentioned”. (Peter Hitchens, The Rage Against God: Why Faith is the Foundation of Civilisation, Continuum International Publishing, 2010, p12)

Peter Hitchens now defends the very Scriptures he once burnt as a rebellious teenager. His testimony reminds us that the real issue is not lack of evidence that makes you choose atheism, but what world view you first accept and then use to interpret the evidence. Peter’s life also reminds us that it is possible to have that world view changed. Anyone who takes off Darwin’s glasses and looks into and through the Biblical world view will be pleasantly surprised at how well the evidence does fit God’s Word. Peter Hitchens was!

There is one last sad thing to state: Christopher Hitchens will not like the surprise when he is confronted by the Creator as his Judge, and discovers that God is greater than the entire universe and everything in it, including Christopher Hitchens. How do we know this? Jesus the Creator came to earth as a babe in a manger. No toys. No tree. No tinsel. He grew up in Israel and lived a sinless life. He was crucified, died and buried, and on the third day rose from the dead so we could know for sure that sin and death had been overcome and we could have a Saviour who could give us the gift of eternal life. It’s nearly Christmas 2011. It’s a gift time, but the only real gift we need is the one Christopher Hitchens rejected – eternal life from the real Christ. Don’t make the same mistake. (Ref. philosophy, atheism, humanism)